


Partly Grouchy with a Chance of Snow

by Dawnwind



Category: Starsky & Hutch
Genre: Christmas, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-03
Updated: 2012-11-03
Packaged: 2017-11-17 16:28:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/553584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dawnwind/pseuds/Dawnwind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On a stakeout, Starsky and Hutch encounter something really unusual in Southern California.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Partly Grouchy with a Chance of Snow

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for a Christmas Secret Santa exchange. For Cyn who requested slash, hurt/comfort, and the word candy cane.

Partly Grouchy with a Chance of Snow  
by Dawnwind

Bad luck, that's what it was. Or karma, whatever, but very obviously the universe was trying to send David Starsky a message, and it wasn't good. Had to be from ignoring all the omens. He'd walked under ladders, let black cats cross his path, and stepped on cracks one too many times, and this was the result. Not to mention all the broken mirrors. Hell, looking back on his thirty seven years, he had to have broken three, maybe even four mirrors. That added up to 28 years of bad luck. If he counted his childhood as the good times, he probably had most of those 4 times 7 years to go--practically three decades.

"Is there any way to reverse bad luck?" Starsky said aloud, tucking his freezing hands more firmly up into his arm pits. Lucky arm pits, to be the warmest spot on his body.

"What?" Hutch had been meditating, so at least he'd said he was doing. Starsky was fairly certain he was just napping with his eyes open. It was still dark at four freaking thirty in the morning, for God's sake, and they were sitting in a car, in freezing weather, waiting for a fugitive who probably wouldn't show up.

Just one of the many examples of why Starsky was sure that his collected bad luck had all combined to make his life miserable. Homicides in Bay City were down--which was a good thing, but that left Starsky and Hutchinson free to be loaned out to other departments. They'd been involved in three stake-outs in as many weeks. It was getting tiresome--no, downright depressing. The problem was that in each case the fugitives always seemed to show up on the days Starsky and Hutch were not on duty. So, all of the boredom with none of the excitement of an arrest.

And this case wasn't turning out any better. Two days up at four o'clock just to sit in a car by four thirty. At a time when any reasonable person was bundled up in bed, in what the TV weather people were calling unseasonably cold weather. Unseasonably cold, Starsky's Aunt Fanny. It was frigid, with a side of icy.

"Is there any way to reverse bad luck?" Starsky repeated, just to be peevish.

"I hear that Catholics believe that confession is good for the soul." Hutch stretched as much as he could in a ten year old Impala, their stakeout vehicle du jour.

"In case you never noticed in all this time, buddy, I ain't Catholic."

"No." Hutch looked straight at him finally, his face as serene as a Buddha--but without the round belly. "You most definitely aren't Catholic. Is there any coffee left, or did you drink it all?"

"The only thing keeping me sane in this whole damned place," Starsky groused, handing over the silver flask.

"Meditating does wonders for me." Hutch poured a cup of coffee, his face suddenly enveloped in steam. He smiled beatifically, inhaling the aroma of the fragrant brew.

"Finding a quiet place and communing with the inner being. It's really quite restful. You should give it a try."

"I'd rather just sleep. In a real bed, with sheets and blankets." Starsky sniffed the lingering scent of coffee, then peered forlornly into his empty cup. Hutch poured him another without even being asked. The problem was, with all the moist heat coming from their bodies and the hot coffee, the windows had fogged up again, and they couldn't see the front of the Bay City Ice-O-Rama rink.

Starsky turned on the car engine once again to let the heater run for a few minutes. They didn't want to alert anyone by sitting in an idling car for too long, but it was either that or miss a glimpse of their fugitive. The car's heater was a finicky thing that sputtered, knocked, and spewed noxious fumes the entire time it was running.

"Try taking a deep breath, letting it out and just letting go of all that negativity," Hutch prompted, demonstrating. Starsky grudgingly admitted, to himself, that watching that broad handsome chest move up and down was inspiring, and actually somewhat warming to certain regions down south, but he'd never tell Hutch that. Just like he'd never tell Hutch that whenever Hutch contemplated his belly button, or whatever the hell he was doing in the meditative state, that Starsky was also contemplating his belly button. And his nipples, his thighs, and the huge Yule log jutting out through the thin white pants Hutch often wore when he was practicing transcendental meditation.

Noticing that Starsky wasn't following his lead, Hutch patted his partner's leather jacket padded belly. "C'mon, Starsk. In with the good and out with the bad."

"If I blow it off, won't it fill the car with bad cooties?" Starsky huffed a short breath, but all it did was make him cough. Damned clogged heater vent.

"There are no bad cooties." Hutch directed those polar cap blue eyes at Starsky with the sigh of someone faced with a hopeless task. "Positive vibes conquer even the most pessimistic mindset."

"This sounds really weird, even for you." Starsky drank down some of the coffee and wished for a donut. With jelly in the center and red and green sprinkles on the top, just to be festive.

"I've turned over a new leaf, Starsk. Embraced the holiday season and all that goes with it." Hutch pointed through the now crystal clear front windshield. "Isn't that pretty? The ice rink decorated with candy canes and a big, bouncy Santa Claus?"

"Made of Styrofoam."

"What would you rather he be made out of?"

"It's the whole principle of the thing." Starsky gritted his teeth, watching the first few cars pull into the parking lot. Crazy skaters, driven to practice their routines at ungodly hours in the mostly vain hopes of winning a trophy and having some Olympic scout pick them for a chance of patriotic glory in the winter games. The fact that escaped bomber Chester Klinefeld had a gifted daughter who really did stand a chance of competing for a gold medal just made everything more effed up. What weird quirk of fate had put a psychotic whippo who enjoyed seeing things go boom in the same world, much less the same family as blond haired, blue eyed Bay City sweetheart Elizabeth Klinefeld?

"Where's that old Ken Hutchinson I used to know who hated all the euphoric sentimentality, the crowded malls, the fake holiday cheer, and all that crap?" Starsky narrowed his eyes at the blond beside him. Truth be told, Hutch had become quite the Christmas elf for a couple of years now. It was downright disturbing.

"Ghost of Christmas past, Starsky." Hutch cracked a window, the heater was really stinking up the car interior. "It's a been a whole new decade for two years, and I'm maintaining a more optimistic view. Winter is a time for reflecting on the past and planning for the future. Showing friends how you feel about them, and expressing good will to all men and peace to the earth."

"Tell that to Chester Klinefeld."

"He's a conflicted man, it's true. A decade in the slammer would do the man a world of good." Hutch nodded emphatically. "But wanting to see his only daughter at Christmas time shows that there is some good left in him somewhere."

"I'm beginning to think I liked the old pessimistic Hutch better." Starsky watched the dedicated parents herding their athletic offspring into the ice-o-rama. Colt-legged young girls with their hair pulled back into sleek chignons, carrying skates over their shoulders, and broad shouldered boys with round muscled thighs trooped across the pre-dawn parking lot for their before-school practice. He recognized Dorothea Klinefeld's red Datsun with the bumper sticker _"Skaters do it on the ice"_ on the back bumper. "There she is."

Hutch raised a pair of binoculars to keep a closer watch, but Starsky could see Elizabeth easily enough in the bright lights that illuminated the parking lot, wearing a bright blue parka and tight legged jeans. She carried a pink and white bag and hurried into the ice rink, just catching up to a pair of dark skinned twins who ice danced. Starsky had gone inside the cavernous building on Monday to scope out the exits and entrances, and stood entranced, watching the brother and sister pair glide across the ice like ethereal characters from a fairy story.

There were four ways out of the building, meaning that there had to be two stakeout vehicles. One for the south and west ends, and the other for the north and east ends. At least the eastern side could watch the sunrise. Starsky didn't even have that small pleasure to look forward to.

"Elizabeth and Dorothea are inside without incident," Hutch reported, putting the binoculars down to watch Starsky note that into the log book. "C'mon, Starsk, look on the bright side. Only two more days and then we're off the rotation."

"I hate to say it, but I kinda wish there were a rash of perplexing murders about now," Starsky said gloomily. "Murders that could be investigated in the day time, indoors. This is supposed to be Southern California, famed for sun, beaches, warm winds, and surfing. I left the east coast because of weather like this." He shivered, wondering if the redheaded weather girl on channel 7 could be correct. Freezing temperatures for three days running was killing Banana palms and all manner of tropical flora. Snow had been predicted. In Bay City! Oh, sure, it snowed all the time on Big Bear, and on all the mountains surrounding the Los Angeles basin, even down to elevations of two thousand feet on the odd occasion. But at sea level? It was mind blowing.

"You left New York for entirely different reasons than blizzards in the winter." Hutch finished off his coffee cup and left it on the dashboard, which irritated Starsky for all sorts of reasons.

Ignoring Hutch's indisputable logic, Starsky dared pulling his fingers out of their warm arm pits to rub his cold nose. Dogs were supposed to have cold noses, not cops. He'd probably get some horrible infection and cough for the rest of the winter. "Don't tell me you miss snow drifts above your head, shoveling out the driveway, and living inside for four months of the year."

"Duluth winters can be brutal," Hutch agreed. "But there's skiing, sledding, ice fishing . . ." He pointed to the ice rink. "We used to skate all the time when I was a kid. My sister Karen took skating lessons and I used to play some hockey."

"By the look of your nose, you didn't play for very long." Starsky said dryly. Most hockey players he'd even seen looked like they'd had the puck slammed into their face one too many times. "And you've got all your teeth."

"Skating is a lot like meditating. Or flying. You're going so fast everything nasty just blows right out of your brain." Hutch smiled, his eyes unfocused as if he were watching the ten year old he used to be sailing over the ice with hockey stick in hand.

"Well, lookee here," Starsky grabbed his partner's arm. "Something nasty just drove into the parking lot." He grabbed the binoculars to make sure, but the car was close enough for him to recognize Klinefeld's shoulder length greasy blond hair.

"Let him start walking toward the rink before we get out." Hutch checked under his jacket for his pistol, sliding it in and out of the holster. He settled it back into the leather sheath but left his green and gold parka unzipped.

"He's just sitting there." Starsky kept the binocs trained on the dingy white Chevy parked four spaces beyond Dorothea's Datsun. "You want to close in on him before he gets near the girl?"

Hutch held up a silencing finger as he murmured instructions into the mic, talking to the cops on the Northeast side of the building. "Clausen says hold off until he's out of the car. We don't want a high speed chase through the streets at this hour."

"Hell, I didn't want to be up at this hour." Starsky checked his own weapon and eased the side door open, just to be ready. Cold air came in through the gap and he shivered morosely. "But nobody asked me."

Both watched their prey for another three minutes until Klinefeld stepped out of his car, adjusted a jaunty red muffler around his neck, which conveniently covered half his face, and walked over to his ex-wife's car. He peered in the side window and then tucked a small package under the windshield wiper.

"Call the bomb squad!" Hutch said, getting out of the car faster than Starsky could.

Left with no choice, Starsky radioed metro for the bomb guys, his heart in his mouth the whole time. Hutch walked casually across the tarmac in Klinefeld's wake.

Sure that the bomber would turn around and recognize that he was being followed, Starsky cut off the mic as soon as he'd relayed all pertinent information. Since Klinefeld was nearly inside the ice rink, with Hutch only seconds behind him without back-up, Starsky put on the speed and dashed the length of the football field sized parking lot. He grabbed the door, easing inside with all caution. This is when it could get hairy. All these kids on the ice, whatever employees and parents might be around, plus Hutch. Starsky's first priority as a police officer was to protect the citizens and arrest the criminals, but his primary concern would always and ever be Hutch. Ken Hutchinson, his detective partner, and more importantly, the sexy blond man who shared his bed every night--even on nights where they had to get up so early they barely got any sleep. That was the Hutch whom Starsky worried most about.

Keeping one hand tucked under his leather jacket, on the butt of his pistol, Starsky walked carefully into the Ice-O-Rama. The layout was pretty typical for a skating rink. Small dining area to the right of the door, skate rentals to the left with the lockers and changing area just beyond that. The bulk of the place was a huge circular sheet of ice with a hulking Zamboni machine sitting on the far left end. Starsky stood at the main entrance. There were two service entrances on either end, one for the Zamboni machine and the other for deliveries, with the fire exit at the rear of the place. Just where all the parents were clustered on bleachers watching their Olympic hopefuls perform salchows, walleys and axels.

Klinefeld had stopped because Elisabeth was center ice, twirling endlessly, her left foot raising until she grabbed it with one hand flung over her head and did vertical splits, still spinning. It was an awe-inspiring sight. Luckily, Hutch had his eyes more on the father than the daughter, and when Chester shook out of his daze and began walking out onto the ice, Hutch took charge.

"Hey, buddy, no street shoes on the ice!" Hutch shouted.

Klinefeld ignored him, but by this time the other skaters were once again circling the rink and the man was getting in their way. He pushed two delicate girls to the ice in an attempt to get over to his child, causing a pile up as skaters bumped into one another. Elizabeth had glided off toward the left, and not seen her father yet. Dorothea, on the other hand, had.

"Elizabeth! Get off now!" she screamed, running around the outside of the rink toward the rounded end.

"This is the police!" Hutch boomed, pulling his pistol. "Chester Klinefeld, you are in violation of a restraining order and under arrest."

"She's my kid!" Chester was as sure footed on the ice as a sled dog. Elizabeth had obviously inherited all her talent from him. Even without skates, Chester walked confidently without sliding. Elizabeth tried zooming around him, her blades shimmering silver in the overhead lights, but her father was lightning fast and grabbed her as she passed. Her momentum slammed them both into the curved wooden barrier separating the skaters from the spectators. Dorothea shrieked in terror, reversing direction to run to her daughter. The other skaters jammed the narrow passage in the low wall, trying to get out of the arena.

Starsky ran around the perimeter, his eyes on Hutch now crossing the ice, but the terrified children were now clogging the walkway. In desperation, Starsky vaulted the thigh high barrier and landed on his knees on the frozen surface.

"Daddy!" Elizabeth struggled against her father's grip, her pretty face shocked and frightened when he produced a gun, aiming it at Hutch.

"There's no where to go, Chester!" Hutch yelled. "Don't put all these people in danger. Give up, and things will go easier on you." He pulled his Python, but Starsky could see the wariness on Hutch's face. There were too many people in the building, too many chances to shoot the wrong person.

"My daughter and me are gonna spend Christmas together," Klinefeld declared, pulling her up close to him. "Right, Betsy?"

"Daddy!" Elizabeth whimpered.

"Chester, don't hurt my baby!" Dorothea cried helplessly.

Out of the corner of his eye Starsky could see Joe Clausen, one of the other detectives, easing the young skaters out of the danger area, but he kept most of his focus directly on Hutch and Klinefeld. Hutch was now center ice, advancing steadily on the bomber and his daughter. Hutch had good balance and rubber soled shoes but walking on ice wasn't easy; periodically he'd slither and slide on the slippery stuff. Klinefeld still seemed completely comfortable with nary a shimmy in his stride. He towed Elizabeth, on her skates, backwards toward the left side exit.

Elizabeth raised one foot as if to take another step back, and jammed the razor sharp blade into her father's shin. Klinefeld howled, surprise causing him to loosen his grasp on Elizabeth. Smart girl, she made like a world champion speed skater and accelerated away so quickly she left divots in the ice.

Hutch lunged forward, going for Klinefeld's gun hand, but Chester was too fast for him. He might be bleeding from a gash on the leg, but he swung wide, bring the butt of his pistol down on Hutch's shoulder. Reeling, Hutch tried to pull Klinefeld down with him but got a knee in the belly for his troubles. Klinefeld shoved Hutch against the wooden barrier, then turned, running across the ice as if it weren't the slipperiest stuff on earth.

"Freeze, Klinefeld! Drop your weapon!" Starsky shouted, trying to aim his gun and run on ice at the same time. He kept falling and scrambling to his feet, concerned for Hutch, but mostly trying to prevent the bomber from getting around the Zamboni and out to freedom.

Klinefeld paused at the hulking piece of machinery, and pulled off a shot in Starsky's direction. Starsky swerved, slid, and did a belly plant right into the ice. It was shockingly cold. Just as he tried to get a purchase on the freezing, wet surface, an ear shattering boom shook the ice rink, the floor under Starsky rumbling as if there had been an earthquake.

"What was that?" someone cried.

"A car blew up!" one of the parents called out. "It's on fire."

"Terrific." Starsky groaned, his shirt and jeans soaked. He tried again to get up, looking over to see his partner raise up onto one knee, sighting his long barreled pistol with precision.

Hutch pulled off one shot, catching Klinefeld in the left leg, the same one Elizabeth had gouged. Clausen scrambled over the barrier, with his partner Davolos guarding his back, and kicked Klinefeld's gun away as if it were the winning puck in a hockey match. "Chester Klinefeld, you are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent . . ."

Feeling suddenly weary as the adrenaline rush cleared, Starsky knee-walked over to the barrier to pull himself to a stand. He'd never liked skating. Never liked the cold, and never, ever would be able to watch ice skating without thinking of Elizabeth Klinefeld's masterful move--what would that be called? Half camel into the Tibia? Skating announcers always had weird, probably made-up names for all the moves.

"Hutch, you okay?" Starsky tottered over to his partner who was sitting on the ice, looking just as exhausted as he did.

"Guess we did it this time, Stark." Hutch grinned lazily up at him. "You wanted a little action, you got it."

"I woulda been happier if you hadn't gone all Dirty Harry on the guy and tried to do it by yourself." He perched on the wooden wall, not willing to get the seat of his jeans just as wet as the front of them.

"Elizabeth looked a little too much like Karen." Hutch shrugged. "I was suddenly scared, y'know? Not scared for me, but for her . . .and everyone else in the place. You."

"Yeah." There was an odd little twist in his heart. Starsky tousled Hutch's already mussed blond hair. "You ready to get up? Your butt must be freezing."

"I guess you'll have to warm it up later, huh?" Hutch chuckled, but there was that slightly hysterical we-just-dodged-a-bullet quality to his voice.

"Hutch!" Starsky glanced around to make sure there were no witnesses to Hutch's outrageous comment. The thing was, he had something along those lines planned that would warm up all their parts. "C'mon, get up, you've had enough hockey for one day."

"Actually, my ankle is probably sprained. Doctors always say that icing it first thing is best." Hutch pointed, then rubbed his left shoulder. It was a toss-up to which one looked more swollen, the lower extremity or the upper.

"You want a paramedic?"

"No, just a couple more minutes."

"I could get us a couple of hot chocolates from the vending machine," Starsky offered. He knew they should be getting up, helping with the mop up after the arrest, but weirdly, after days of sitting in the car doing nothing, it felt quite relaxing to sit and do nothing.

"That'd be good."

"Got any quarters?" Starsky pulled two dimes out of his damp pocket. Hutch laughed again, this time sounding much calmer, and fished fifty cents out of his pants.

"Extra cream in mine."

"Want little marshmallows?"

"What's hot chocolate without marshmallows to dunk?"

Sipping the chocolate, they were both drawn back into the fray, questioning and reassuring parents, coordinating with the other officers, promising to be down at metro pronto to interrogate Klinefeld; all the chores that constituted their jobs as detectives. One of the grateful parents turned out to be an orthopedic surgeon who diagnosed Hutch's ankle as only bruised and strained, but he wrapped it up in an Ace bandage and produced a pair of well used crutches from the first aid cabinet. The equally grateful owner of the rink provided the detectives with matching sweat shirts and pants emblazoned with the words "The Penguins! Award winning Bay City Junior Hockey Team" down the sleeve and pants leg. Reporters prowled around, trying to get a photo of Elizabeth and her no-good father, but both had been spirited away first thing. Film of the detectives in their Penguin finery would play on the morning news.

Glad of his warm clothes, Starsky just forged ahead, doing what had to be done. He found himself continually looking over at Hutch who leaned on crutches while questioning the mother of the ice dancing twins, feeling like the luckiest man on the planet. Finding a leprechaun's pot of gold wouldn't have been any better. Both he and Hutch had been in tighter, and possibly more dangerous spots in the past, and by the grace of God--or whoever it was who ruled the fates--Hutch had only been banged up and not shot. But it was times like these that brought home just how thankful he was for the little things.

Having Hutch in his life was no means little, it was the biggest thing of all. The little things were what brought continual joy. Sharing a hot chocolate in an ice rink. Snuggling in bed eating Oreos after some really great sex. Even arguing about the meaning of Christmas in an old wreck of an Impala. He wouldn't trade a single moment of his very lucky life for all the tea in China. Heck, all the coffee in the Boston harbor, for that matter.

"Detective?" A crime lab tech called Starsky over to point out the bullet hole in the wooden barrier. The bullet that had almost creased his skull, but missed. Starsky looked up, catching Hutch's eye across the ice and smiled. Life was great. The four leaf clover, imported straight from County Clare, in Ireland, that he kept in his wallet had finally paid off.

It was six thirty before Starsky and Hutch stepped back outside the Ice-O-Rama. The place was completely transformed. The blast had demolished Dorothea's car, as well as two others on either side, narrowly avoiding Klinefeld's battered Chevy, and blown a crater in the parking lot. Reams of police, firefighters, and bomb squad personnel were still swarming over the crime scene, but there was a strangely holiday atmosphere to the whole place. It was snowing.

This being Southern California, the snow was sparse and melted only minutes after it hit the earth, but a fine dusting of white covered the bomb site, the blackened wrecks, and the Styrofoam Santa in front of the Ice-O-Rama, turning the whole place into a scene right out of a Christmas card a la Sam Peckinpah.

Starsky looked up in amazement, grinned, then opened his mouth to catch a snowflake on his tongue. It tasted like cold, and winter, and wonder. "You ever put your tongue on a pole and have it freeze there?"

Hutch gave him such a look of outraged propriety that Starsky laughed out loud, ho ho hoing up at the morning sky. The newly risen sun was just peeking over the edge of a bank of snow clouds, like the golden child not sure if it was supposed to be around when the Snow Queen came out to play. Hutch burst forth with a guffaw of his own, his cheeks blushed red. "No, but I've often fantasized about that when I was writing really boring arrest reports."

Finally realizing how raunchy his original statement had sounded, Starsky wished fervently that he'd meant that all along. "A metal pole, you moron. Nicky did it once."

"Not you, huh?" Hutch smirked.

"Not me." Ignoring their roles as upstanding police detectives for one moment longer, Starsky bent down, gathering as much of the snow as he could into a tiny, very wet snowball and tossed it at his partner.

A direct hit on the front of Hutch's green and gold parka, leaving a wet spot right over his belly. Hutch regarded the mark with raised eyebrows and let go of one of the crutches to point his forefinger with mock severity. "You want to make a snow angel face first into the concrete, Starsk?"

"Nah, I'd rather make sheet angels, babe." Starsky murmured, his voice dipped in honey.

"With any luck, several times--with you."

"You found a way to reverse bad luck?" Hutch blinked, snow catching on his blond eyelashes.

"I had it all along." Starsky nodded, and caught one last snowflake in his mouth. Already the sky was lightening, the sun trying valiantly to reclaim her rights on Southern California. The snow wouldn't last more than an hour, but it had turned a crazy day into one touched by magic. Only once in a blue moon.

"Merry Christmas, Starsk."

Starsky winked at his favorite cop. "That's happy Hanukkah, to you, bub."

The End

And a Happy Euphoric Sentimentality and Glorious Holiday season to you.


End file.
